Target Practice
by a-little-glimmer
Summary: After realizing his feelings for Dan, Phil gets in the habit of throwing darts to release his pent-up emotions. But when he accidentally hits Dan in the face with one, Dan, of course, wants an explanation for all the dart throwing, and the truth is bound to come out. eventual phan. oneshot. inspired by a fb prompt group.


_Thwack, thwack, thwack._ The darts hit the dartboard in quick succession, each hit harder than the last. Phil looks at the darts with a burning glare before relaxing his composure with a sigh, then he goes to retrieve the darts from the board hanging on his bedroom door. He's been at this for almost an hour now, a constant cycle of throwing and retrieving darts that doesn't seem to have any end. And that's just _today_. This new obsession with the darts has been going on for over a week now. The only good thing coming of this unhealthy obsession is that Phil's getting pretty damn good at throwing darts.

Phil scoops the darts into his hand, which were all close to each other near the center, and tugs them off the board in a quick jerk, breaking the magnetic bond they had formed with the board. Of course Dan had gotten Phil a magnetic set of darts; knowing Phil's clumsiness, he would've stabbed himself with a real set during the first five minutes of owning them.

Thinking of Dan makes Phil sigh again, and he quickly takes his spot across the bedroom and starts throwing the darts again. You see, Dan's the reason Phil's doing this. Recently, Phil realized he has... feelings, towards Dan. Attraction feelings. Much stronger than anyone should feel toward his best friend. Okay fine, _romantic_ feelings - _thwack_ _!_ Phil throws the final dart of the three left in his hand in a desperate attempt to get Dan out of his mind. Isn't that the whole point of this exercise?!

Phil hurriedly retrieves the darts so he can start throwing them again, praying all his bottled up emotions will soar out his hand with them. He throws dart after dart, each hit harder than the last, but the thought of Dan never leaves Phil's mind. He moans out an _ugh!_ in frustration, not even knowing or caring if Dan is in the house, and he gets the darts for another round of hurling them furiously at the board. Phil knows this isn't helping anything, and he's even more angry about his feelings today than usual, but he can't exactly talk to Dan about them, now can he? What else is he supposed to do?

Just as he's about to throw another dart, the door suddenly opens and Dan appears in Phil's doorway. A strangled noise escapes Phil's throat as he tries to stop himself in the millisecond between him seeing Dan and him throwing the dart, but his reflexes are too late and the dart flies from his hand, hitting Dan square in the middle of his forehead. The flat, magnetic end of the dart hits Dan with such a force that Dan staggers backward, the dart bouncing off Dan onto the floor between he and Phil.

"Oh my god, Dan!" Phil cries, and he rushes across his room into the hallway where Dan is clutching his forehead. "Are you alright?!"

" _Clearly_ I'm not, Phil! What the fuck was that?!" Dan shouts, shrugging out of Phil's grip on his shoulder.

"I'm so sorry, I was playing darts and the dartboard is on my door, then you opened it and I couldn't stop myself..." Phil nervously babbles, trying to explain.

"Alright, alright, I'm fine now," Dan gripes a few seconds later, after vigorously rubbing his forehead. He lets his hand fall to his side, revealing a large red welt beginning to form where the dart hit him.

"Oh, god," Phil breathes. He ghosts a finger over the red mark on Dan's forehead as Dan awkwardly looks up at him, blushing from the gentle touch. "I'm so sorry," Phil repeats quietly.

Dan clears his throat and takes a step back from the strangely intimate moment. "Is it bad?"

"Erm... kind of. You're.. you're fine, though." It seems Phil's reassuring himself more than Dan.

"Well, I'm really glad I got you the magnetic set instead of a real one," Dan laughs. "Otherwise I'd be, uh, pretty dead right now."

"I'm so sorry." Phil winces.

"Hey, hey, it's fine, I'm only joking," Dan says, not realizing before how badly Phil felt about hitting him.

Phil gnaws on his lip and rubs the mark on Dan's forehead again with his thumb. "You're fine," he breathes, more to himself than to Dan. He shakes his head a bit, then says, "why were you coming into my room anyway?"

Dan scoffs in amusement. "I was going in to talk to you about the darts! You're been in your room a lot recently, just hurling those darts at the wall. Are you okay?"

Phil looks down at the floor, not meeting Dan's eyes. "Yes, I'm fine," he says quietly.

"C'mon, Phil, clearly something's bothering you. You know you can tell me anything," Dan prompts.

"Actually, you're the one person I can't tell," Phil murmurs.

The words sting Dan like a tiny bee piercing his ear. His eyes scrunch up in an odd mixture of sadness and confusion. "Phil, of.. of course you can tell me. I... I'm your best friend." But Phil still stays silent. "Whatever it is, I won't judge you or laugh at you, I promise."

Phil opens his mouth - then hesitates. "I'm sorry, Dan, I really can't," He says.

Now Dan is a little exasperated. "Phil, I think you owe it to me to tell me, if you did _this_ to me over it," He exclaims, gesturing to the dart's mark on his forehead.

Phil hesitates again, then seems to make up his mind after hearing Dan's outburst: "Alright, fine, Dan. The reason is you," He says, pacing a little bit down the hallway and back.

This throws Dan for a loop. " _Me?_ Did I do something wrong?"

"No, you did nothing wrong," Phil says. "You just... you _exist_. That's it!" He cries in frustration. "But that's enough. I... I like you. Too much. I have all these _feelings_ for you, and... it's just... do you know how _hard_ it is for me to be around you?! Especially with preparing for the tour and everything, I'm around you _all the time_! And it's just... too much! So I take it out on the dartboard so I don't go insane with these feelings clouding my brain every _second_ of every _minute_ of every _day_ that I'm with you," Phil pours out, and he tries to catch his breath after confessing.

Dan just gapes at him. "I'm.. sorry?" He says confusedly, still in shock at Phil's declaration. It seems Phil had been needing to get that off his chest for a while.

"Don't be. I'm the one who's sorry. You don't have to say anything, just... just forget about this, alright?" He lingers in the hallway for a moment, then just looks at Dan sadly once more before turning to go back into his bedroom.

But Dan softly touches his arm, and Phil stops, however, he doesn't turn back around. "I don't want to forget about this. I.. I like you too," Dan says with a shy smile.

A smile begins to creep onto Phil's face as well, and he turns to face Dan. "R-really?" He asks hesitantly. Hopefully.

"Does this answer your question?" And Dan pulls Phil towards him, pressing a soft kiss onto his lips. When they pull apart, a little grin takes over Phil's mouth. "Yeah, it does," he laughs, biting his lip.

Dan smiles up into Phil's face for another moment, then turns as if addressing an invisible audience with a clap of his hands.

"Right, so who's up for another round of darts?"

~fin

A/N: hey guys! thanks for reading my little oneshot. this phanfic was inspired by a prompt from tayrulez on here, she created a writing prompts group for fanfic writers like me on this site (hit her up if you want to join it), and she gave us a set of words with the hope we'd write a fic based off one of them. this fic was inspired off the word 'accuracy,' finally it's finished lol. anyway, give this a fav if you liked it, and please leave a review telling me what you think! thanks again for checking this fic out, and i'd love it if you'd check out my profile to read more of my stuff. ~l


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